Roger Goodell is strongly considering leaving the NFL to be in charge of the NCAA and college football. “My penchant for arbitrary rules and arbitrary rulings will receive more support when applied to student athletes.” #satiresaturday
Achilles the runner, Pheidippides
the marathon’s first participant and
casualty. Wrestler’s strength, swimmer’s high seas
but the runner needs only open land
to practice the craft: breath controlled, posture
straight, arms relaxed, back kick steady, watch the
road. Sounds of birds (or iPod playlist) cure
malaise of winter’s fog. Days without a
clock get longer, legs without a lunge grow
stronger. (Though squats and lunges help to cross-
train). Run consistent, switch it up, ‘cause though
running stills, the mind and will, your thoughts ought
know that burn-out’s real. That’s true in all things–
keep your pace, peace’ll find your mind and heart strings.
George dates a girl who’s given up alcohol for Lent. In a show of solidarity, he tells her he will give up caffeine. He really doesn’t, and she suspects he’s lying. But she can’t prove it. But what upsets him the most is not that she thinks he’s untruthful, it’s that she won’t stop telling everyone she stopped drinking for Lent.
George: It’s annoying, Jerry! Every time we go somewhere it’s, “sorry bartender, can you make me a mocktail? I gave up drinking for Lent.”
Jerry: Look at her observing a religious tradition. She ought to be ashamed of herself.
George: *to the waitress* Another cup of coffee over here! *to Jerry* And she doesn’t believe I gave up caffeine at all. She doesn’t say anything, but it’s how she looks at me when she orders her O’Douls.
Jerry: But you haven’t given up caffeine!
George: Yeah, but she doesn’t know that! As far as she’s concerned I’m my usual, perky energetic self with no help from anything except pure adrenaline and testosterone.
Jerry: Yeah, that’s what she thinks. By the way, why are you giving up anything for Lent? You’re not religious.
George: Oh no, I’m still Latvian Orthodox.
Jerry: You never converted back?
George: Never converted back!
After the first weekend of the NCAA tournament, Elaine has already won her office pool because her bracket is perfect. She’s successfully picked every game, and now, every gambler in New York City is calling her for advice.
Elaine: I don’t even know how they got my number! I just wrote down names on a sheet of paper!
Kramer: I gave out your number.
Elaine: You what?!
Kramer: That’s right. You’ve got a gift. And when you’ve got a gift, you share it or you’ll lose it.
Elaine: I’ve got a gift for you! It involves losing your life!
The swish of hoops, the squeak of swoosh, Nikes
Reeboks, ‘Didas, Armour, run down hardwood
An’ fly through air. Tourney dreams turn dream-like
State as kids storm courts and screams and hugs could
Be like speech—understood. But games must end
And losers named. Brackets busted upsets
Reign. Seasons over, college seniors send
Résumés—twenty-two—retir’ment met
Final quatrain of the season, epics
Played with steel-rimed goals, leather hopes, but now
Games nearly done, two teams left: set picks,
Defense, plays are run. Five month poem, how
Will it end? Blow out win that’s heaven sent?
Or a buzzer beater’s shining moment?
Bracket Flames 
Villanova Piccolo Player
Coach K, Cutting Down the Nets
“A beautiful naked blond jumps up and down” –Chapter 10 of The Memory Book, by Harry Lorayne and (NBA Hall of Famer and Ohio State grad) Jerry Lucas
“Everything with Dick [LeBeau] is mathematical in nature. The proper angles allow leverage on the route […] It was here where LeBeau was especially unpredictable.”
–Ron Jaworski, The Games That Changed the Game
When I taught at MTSU, I remember writing the above sentence on the board as a way of getting my class’ attention before teaching them what’s known as the Major system, a way of memorizing large numbers where 0-9 are converted to consonant sounds so that instead of learning a nonsensical string of digits, one is able to learn a word, phrase, or sentence, which would have a greater context and would thus be more likely to stick in one’s mind. I also remember a woman walking into my classroom because she left a book in their. She paused as she looked at the board, asked what it was about. I explained, she nodded curtly and said, “Very interesting. I’ll let you get back to your class. By the way, I teach Women’s Studies.”
As a college freshman in 1959, Lucas wrote a thank you letter to Harry Lorayne, a writer known for his appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson where he would memorize the names of everyone in the audience. Lucas’ letter thanked Lorayne for his books which had helped him become a stronger student and thinker. Little did the two know that they’d collaborate on a book years later.
Harry Lorayne, Memory Master
Lucas’ freshman year at Ohio State would have coincided with Dick LeBeau’s senior year. It’s almost certain they would’ve crossed paths, even if it were just in passing. In fact, we know Lucas was so good that even Woody Hayes stuck around to watch his freshman games (this, of course, was when freshmen were ineligible to play varsity).
Now, just because they were at the same school at the same time for one year doesn’t mean Lucas shared Harry Lorayne’s memory techniques. If anything, Lucas would’ve shared them with his roommate, future Celtic Hall of Famer John Havlicek before anyone on the basketball team, let alone with any football players. But just as some ideas have a way of spreading through the ether, like how the cartoon Dennis the Menace debuted on the same day in two countries by writers who’d never heard of each other or each other’s work, it’s possible the two developed similar memory methods independent of one another.
Jerry Lucas, OSU
Tony Buzan, the Brit responsible for the World Memory Championships, says that contest is more of a contest of “creativity than memory.” It’s true; to memorize a deck of cards in a minute (actually the American record is less than a minute), you don’t need raw IQ power. You need a storehouse of creative images for each card (for an effective image list for each card check out Tim Ferriss’ The Four Hour Chef).
How do all these names tie into Dick LeBeau and the Titans? In his book The Games That Changed the Game, Ron Jaworski devotes an entire chapter to the creativity of LeBeau’s blitzes and his credentials as a Renaissance Man: “Sid Gillman asked a college math professor to help him apply geometry to determine where his receivers needed to be in San Diego’s pass offense […] LeBeau is so intelligent that he calculated his defenders’ angles all by himself.” Does this mean that LeBeau, this human Swiss army knife, knows how to memorize a deck of cards or a large group of numbers? Of course not. But Jaworski points out that LeBeau can “repair wristwatches, play guitar, and has a photographic memory” and can “recite verbatim the dialogue from his favorite film.” The depth of his knowledge and the creativity of his thinking suggests that he has independently come up with his own way of storing information. And it wouldn’t be surprising if it bared close resemblance to Lucas’ more formal system.
Dick LeBeau, Hall of Fame Player/Coach,
But here’s the point: we train our minds to be more efficient, to solve problems more easily, to remember more information quickly. Films and the USA Network make it seem as if an agile mind is the result of some quirk of nature more so than perfecting a specific aspect of mental fitness. But most often, it’s a result of rigorous thought exercise, just like the body. Are some people naturally able to retain a great deal of information? Probably so, just like some people naturally have abs in their 30s. But someone who’s trained well is going to have a more fit mind (or body) than someone who just possesses it naturally.
LeBeau is highly intelligent, but I think his intelligence springs from a creative, organized mind honed over years of developing a mental system of categorizing information. He’s devoted that mind to teaching football. He’s had success in Detroit, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh. And even though he doesn’t have quite the same quality of players he had in those cities, he brings with him, not just a football mind, but an egoless attitude that’s contagious with both coaches and players. And as we know, scheme and culture can have almost as much to do with a player (or team’s) success than talent. In a game like football where so much is scripted, coaching counts for much.
Now, about the “beautiful naked blond [who] jumps up and down” it’s a way of remembering the number 91852719521639092112. There are other ways to memorize numbers, but the Major System, like a straight line to the quarterback, is most efficient. You assign a consonant sound to every number 0-9. It’s essentially an alphabet for numbers. Here’s how it’s laid out in nearly every reputable memory book:
0 = s or z
1= t or d
2 = n
3 = m
4 = r
5 = l
6 = j or ch or sh
7 = k
8 = f or v
9 = b or p
Remember, this goes by sound. So, for example, the first letter in “century” would begin with “0” because of the “soft c” sound whereas the word “cat” would begin with a “7” because of the “hard c” sound. Also, double letters count as one number, so the word “tummy” would be an acceptable way to memorize the number “13” because you’re counting consonant sounds, not actual consonants.
Now that you know how to memorize numbers, you can use your creativity to remember the contract figures of all the free agents that the Titans didn’t sign.
LeBeau in Action
“Well, it’s about time Disney started making Frozen 2. What took y’all so long anyway?” –Mayweather & Pacquiao #fakequotefriday
“In a dark time, the eye begins to see.” –Theodore Roethke
Bill Belichick on his iPad on a treadmill. Even if you didn’t see the NFL Network’s A Football Life where that image was shown, I imagine the awkwardly worded syntax of the previous sentence not only didn’t cause any problems but also helped you conjure the picture of him in his blue hoodie, staring at game film, each step on the treadmill wheel moving in sync with the wheels turning in his head, noticing whatever Bill Belichick notices when watching film.
But plenty of coaches do something similar to or the equivalent of that. It’s not like he’s the only coach who works hard, nor is he the only coach who knew at a young age that he wanted to be a coach. There’s never just one reason for someone’s success, but I have a theory for one of his reasons: he’s simply watched more film than anyone else. I’m not saying he’s spent more time watching film than anyone else (although I’m sure he’s in the top 5). I’m saying he’s seen more plays, schemes, and formations than anyone else.
I’ve recently read several books on speed reading, and it has three Do Not’s: do not regress, do not transfix, and do not subvocalize. Now, the third one is impossible to completely avoid. There may be some outliers who can read completely with their eyes, but they are a miniscule minority. Even those who are up to 1,000 words a minute, say some of the words to themselves. That said, the other two are easy habits to break. To stop transfixing, simply run your finger or a pen under each line, using it as a motor to keep your eyes and mind moving forward. And regressing is simply about having the discipline to not go back, even after saying to yourself, “wait, what did I just read?”
Therefore, you can solve two of the Do Not’s can be solved by constantly moving forward. Always keep going. If you’re trying to just get through a book because you want to find out what happens, keep going. If you’re trying to study for a test, keep going. If you have no idea what you’re reading, keep going. Don’t stop, even if you don’t feel like you’re getting anything out of it.
Here’s the reason why: you can always go back. This next sentence will sound untrue, but it absolutely is. Thrice reading a text at three times your normal rate is better than reading it at your regular comprehension rate once. The only way to increase your speed is to go faster than your normal reading rate. Here’s the thing: your brain will catch up.
I’m aware that there’s an obvious difference between words on a screen and players on a field, and I don’t want to minimalize that. But what I’m discussing focuses less on what happens on the field than what happens in the film room. And I don’t want to sound as if reading books is too similar to watching film. If that were true, Ryan Fitzpatrick would still be a Titan, in fact, he’d still be a Bill. But when you draw parallels from disparate elements, you’re talking more about general principles than you are about specific parts.
Keeping this in mind, I’m moving to a much safer generalization: everyone in the NFL watches film. Most players can draw up plays on the board and discuss football concepts as they relate to their position, and if they can’t, they’re not in the league for long.
So not being able to read a defense is a misnomer; I’m willing to bet that the best football minds have study habits similar to the most efficient readers. Let me draw a parallel: I graduated from college with an English degree, so I can intelligently discuss Shakespeare, Mark Twain and most other major author. All of us English majors read. But some have read more widely and more deeply than others. There’s always some that have read much less but are able to get by. Regardless, all of us have read, read poems, read plays, read novels, read short stories, and read essays about all of those genres. But some, despite the pulls on his and energy that we all have, find a way to read, not just the Sherman Alexie short story that was due for class but a few other Sherman Alexie short stories and an essay or two of literary criticism about Sherman Alexie.[1]
So, to continue this book as game tape metaphor, every coach is well read. But some coaches read and study better than others. They have a more effective method of preparing for games. I think what Belichick does is not just watch film, but watch film and then trace the genesis of a particular defensive (or offensive) scheme. He does the equivalent of speed reading through a text, which gives him more time to not just re-read but to fit in extra reading. He puts in the same amount of work that his colleagues do, but he gets more out of that time because he’s not wasting time regressing but pushing forward and allowing his mind to catch up.
The idea is that even if he missed something, he’s going to go back and review. So get through that initial reading without worrying about ideas you’ve missed here and there (because you still miss ideas with your bad habits). Believe it or not, you can read faster if you preview quickly, read at a more normal rate (but at a rate slightly faster than what you’re comfortable with), and then review quickly. Every version of speed reading, whether it’s the Evelyn Woods Method used by John F. Kennedy or the Photoreading technique used by Jimmie Carter incorporates previewing, “reading,” and reviewing.
These are the principles. And like Emerson said, “learn the principles and you may choose your method.” But most of us don’t. We labor slowly, trudging through a text with inefficient yet determined labor. We tend to think of speed as either a mark of genius or a mark of carelessness. But what if it’s neither? What if it’s just a better way of doing something we thought we were doing right?
[1] I taught a Sports & Lit Honors course and taught Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. It’s a great read. And if you don’t have time for that, read his short story “Do Not Go Gentle”
“It’s like a finger pointing at the moon. Don’t concentrate on the finger or else you’ll miss all that heavenly glory.” –Bruce Lee
I don’t like Kentucky. I don’t trust Calipari. But if they go into the tournament undefeated, I will want to see them win their next six games, raise the National Championship trophy, and make the Bluegrass state smile. And not because they’re in the SEC but because I enjoy rare, high level accomplishments, regardless of who’s achieving it. And if we pay attention, John Calipari’s interviews illustrate how to arrive at success more often.
A group of children sat in a classroom, unaware that they were being studied by behavioral psychologists. Even if they were, their minds were temporarily distracted by the easy math problems upon which they eagerly scribbled their answers. The experiment really began when they were given more difficult ones. None of the children got the problems right. But something happened next: they were again given easy problems. One group of students completed the problems easily while another group was so distracted by their inability to solve the difficult problems that they had trouble completing the once easy task before them.
Dr. Carol Dweck is a leading researcher in developmental psychology. She talks about how these two types of learners: incremental and entity. The former views learning as a process, a constantly evolving growth of mind and intelligence. The latter views learning as a result, something you’ve achieved. Essentially, entity learners do well as long as they’re succeeding. Their identity is so tied into results that when they come up short, they don’t bounce back as well. Part of long-term winning involves learning from losses.
It’s like the fastest kid in class racing the new guy and losing. If he comes back the next day wanting to race again, it reflects an incremental thought process. But if he slows up before the race is even over, claiming he wasn’t trying, then that kid is an entity thinker who will likely only race guys he knows he can beat.
College coaches are highly paid, highly specialized college professors, so they know that learning is like water cupped in your hands—you may have it. But that possession is precarious. On some level, it’s easy to hold, but then again, it’s easy to lose. And a coach’s wins are based, in part, on the ability to teach. And winning, like learning or power or love or faith, is an abstract concept that you must work to grasp and work to keep or else it can slip quickly through your fingers. Incremental thinkers intuitively understand this, which is why they, in general, succeed more than entity thinkers.
This is why Calipari makes such a big deal about defensive lapses after clear blowouts. Staying focused on process when results are so prominent is difficult. What’s harder? Keeping others focused on it. And Calipari’s not alone. The most famous Vince Lombardi quote is “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.” Yet let’s not forget that he could talk about the Green Bay power sweep for 8 hours. That means he could start talking about this one play while someone clocks into work. And after that person has played on Facebook, watched YouTube videos, went to lunch, came back, did two hours of real work before clocking out, Lombardi would just be finishing up his discussion—about one play. The length of time is probably apocryphal, but the message is clear: Lombardi valued process. You see this same thread of thought in any of Phil Jackson’s books.
Obviously, I don’t know what kind of learners the individual Kentucky players are, but we have enough seasons of background to know that collectively, teams who earn 1 loss late in the season falter worse than undefeated teams. It’s difficult to mark exactly where teams pass that point of no return, but if you’re at 26-0, you’re definitely there. Whether they realize it or not, Kentucky is now a group of entity learners tied to the accomplishment of going undefeated. And Calipari’s job is to keep them more incremental than entity, to keep them focused, not on winning, but on doing the things that produce winning.
Now, the counterpoint to my construct is that each win breeds confidence, and that sense of self creates the habit of winning. There’s power in expecting to win; it’s hard to quantify, but we know it’s there. The “pressure” of maintaining a streak is only a factor if a team doesn’t really expect to be where they’re at. A team like Kentucky with top recruits at a legendary program would feel that pressure less than say an undefeated Tennessee team that doesn’t have a legendary basketball legacy and doesn’t have the best players clamoring to play for it. For Kentucky, each win creates more momentum than tension.
I watch sports to see my teams win, but I also watch to see history. My high school principal was an assistant coach on the undefeated ’76 Indiana team. I wasn’t alive to see that. But I’m alive for this. By default, Kentucky is, on some level, an entity team, but are they more incremental? I don’t want to find out because finding out means they’ll lose before getting to the tournament. Some things you just don’t want to learn.
“But he is always great when some great occasion is presented to him; no man can say he ever had a fit subject for his wit and did not then raise himself as high above the rest.” –John Dryden on Shakespeare
“I think him the most learned and judicious […] He managed his strength to more advantage than any who preceded him […] He was deeply conversant in the ancients.” –John Dryden on Ben Jonson
In 1998, Charles Woodson beat out Peyton Manning for the Heisman trophy, perhaps the most memorable trophy in American sports. Whether he should’ve won is always a fun sports argument. But he did win. That much is indisputable. After the Super Bowl, Woodson’s Michigan teammate beat out Peyton for another title, one much more ethereal and much, much less prestigious: the Best Quarterback of the 21st Century According to Nick Bush. For some reason, no one cares about that title, not even Nick Bush’s own family and friends.
As a lifelong Vol fan, I always made the argument that Manning was and is the greatest because he does more than any quarterback has ever done. When people say a player is a coach on the field, it’s a metaphor. What we mean when someone says that the player possesses enough knowledge and leadership that his teammates must listen when he tells them something during a game. But it’s still a metaphor–even when it comes to Brady. Make no mistake: Brady has freedom to change plays, but he’s not Belichick–he’s an extension of Belichick.
My argument for Manning has always been that when it comes to him, Coach on the Field is literal, not figurative. He runs the practices. Runs the practices. He’s had four head coaches and with the last three, he’s been in charge of the offensive practices! Think about that. He doesn’t call all his own plays, so he’s not a coordinator per se, but he is the only quarterback in the modern era where a team could go into a season without an offensive coordinator, and it wouldn’t be a practical problem (a philosophical one yes because you have to prepare for injuries and things of that nature). And is there any doubt that he’s the best receivers coach in the game? If Manning retired today and said he wanted to coach receivers, there’s not a head coach who wouldn’t accept that. Some wouldn’t make the switch because of loyalty but not because they think their guy would be better than Manning.
Yet with all that, Manning is not Brady. When you say Brady is better than Manning you’re saying that Brady is better at the game of football than Manning, which is true. If we’re talking about playing, yes. In “An Essay of Dramatic Posey,” John Dryden says Shakespeare’s better because he’s “the greater wit,” (wit meaning genius, not wit meaning witty) that we “admire” Jonson but “love Shakespeare.” And that’s the difference. I admire how Manning misses the season and you have to fire everybody, including the scouts because you realize that Manning was propping up your whole organization with his brilliance. That’s admirable. But Brady racing down the field after a great play to violently head butt his receivers like a Himalayan mountain goat fighting over territory–that’s loveable.
And yes, I love Manning the football player, too. And I think he may be more witty, more soulful, more engaging than we give him credit for, but those qualities don’t show up on the field like they do for Brady. And, as quarterbacks, that’s how they must be judged if we’re discussing them as football players. Similarly, Jonson may have been funnier, more witty, more passionate than Shakespeare in a private setting. But it doesn’t quite come across that way in his plays. And if we must discuss them as artists, we must first judge them by their art.
And I’m fine with that. Because to say one artist is more accomplished than the other, diminishes neither man. And for me to say that Brady has bested Manning in no way alters the fact that, I can look at my diploma, read that “University of Tennessee” lettering, and know that I appreciate Manning more.
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